The House That Bruce Built
by Demona Evernight
Summary: I always thought the Batfamily needed a mother figure so this is what I came up with. Bruce had a younger sister who was shot and paralyzed the night their parents were killed and she loved each and every one of the Robin as though they were her own children. A little short story of one-shots. M for Jason's mouth
1. The Beginning

I own nothing but my Oc and the ideas I come up with everything else belongs to DC Comics

* * *

The night we lost our parents was the worst of our lives. A man took our parents away for the pearls around our mother's neck and the money in our father's pocket. Despite their cooperation the thief shot them anyway in cold blood and turned the gun on us. I was almost thankful that he only had time to pull the trigger one more time before he was forced to run away or be caught red handed, unfortunately the last bullet found it's mark...in me.

I heard Bruce scream, I heard him cry out for me and our parents, I wanted to comfort him, tell my big brother everything would be ok, but I couldn't speak and I couldn't move...I couldn't feel my legs.

Someone must have heard Bruce scream because the next thing we knew we were surrounded by police. I was rushed to the hospital once they realized I was still alive and I was taken in for emergency surgery to save my life.

I lived...but they could do nothing for my legs. I would be paralyzed for the remainder of my life and I knew Bruce blamed himself no matter how much I told him it wasn't his fault. Both our parents deaths and my paralysis, but I knew he did it anyway...he was stubborn like that.

When we returned to our family home in the care of our family butler Alfred, the two of them were relentless in making the manor home again. They renovated the entire manor to be wheelchair accessible so that I would still be able to go wherever I liked without having to be carried up and down the stairs, though Bruce and Alfred were happy to do so while the renovations were still underway.

* * *

It was difficult without our parents, but Alfred did his best to help us in anyway he could. He knew it wasn't enough, but it was a greater comfort than most orphans ever got in Gotham.

A few years later I could see Bruce was getting worse. He wouldn't talk to me about it, but I knew our parents deaths had affected him more than he let on, I could see the pain and guilt in his eyes every time he looked at me.

Eventually he left, without a word, to go out into the world to find himself, at least that's what his letter said. He apologized for leaving like that, but he was afraid that if he said goodbye to me in person he would never have the strength to leave me. I understood and I loved him enough not to track him down and bring him back to where it was safe kicking and screaming as I wanted to. I let him go...because he was my big brother and I loved him.

He was away for years. Every few weeks a new post card or letter would find it's way to us describing his adventures, what he was learning, what he was doing. Alfred and I worried about him together, we worried about what he was really doing, we worried if he was safe, we worried that one day we would lose him, we worried that he wouldn't come home.

Then one day...he did, but he wasn't the same...he never really had been since that day, but he was even more different than when he had left.

Bruce had gained height and muscle in his travels, all of his soft edges had become refined and hardened while he was away. I looked at him and for a moment I saw my father...and it brought tears to my eyes.

* * *

After Bruce returned he swiftly took over the company and I willingly handed it over, as much as I loved our parents and their work it just wasn't something I had ever been interested in. No I was a painter and all the proceeds that my artwork gained went to various charities around the city, one Bruce and I made sure were legitimate and actually helped those they said they did. I even had a room on the ground floor that faced, and had a door leading to, the gardens for inspiration and for whenever I wanted to get out for fresh air.

I started realizing how tired Bruce would look not long after he came home. I knew he was partying often, I went to a few of the gala events for charities that he planned, and it worried me that he wasn't getting enough sleep. I told him to slow down, take a day off, relax, but he would just smile gently at me, give me a hug and tell me he was fine and that he could handle it.

Not long later a vigilante calling himself Batman was discovered. A man dressing up as a bat and dealing out justice to the thugs and low lives of the city. I had mixed feelings about his man. While it was good that he was trying to save the city I worried about what would become of it in the wake of this man. For every crook and drug lord this Batman would take down, a new one would rise to take his place stronger and smarter than the one before. It was like trying to fight the Hydra of myth, for every head he would cut off two more would grow more powerful than the last. Eventually it would become too much for Batman to handle, he either needed help or to stop.


	2. Richard Grayson

I own nothing but my Oc everything else belongs to DC Comics

* * *

I remember that day so clearly. I had convinced Bruce to do something fun for himself that didn't include the vultures of high society. He went to the circus. When he came home...there he was.

A little boy no older than eight or ten with black hair and bright blue eyes. He was so small and he looked so scared it pulled at my heartstrings.

Bruce had adopted him after his parents had met an unfortunate end, he was an orphan like us, but we wouldn't let him be like us. I would make sure of it.

In time I learned that the boys name was Richard Grayson, the last remaining member of the famous Flying Grayson's, and I became one of the most important people in that boys world.

Bruce wasn't around much during the day and I knew that upset Richard, I refused to call him Dick despite him telling me I could, I did what I could, but I knew he needed a male role model, not just a broken woman trapped in a chair.

Richard loved me anyway, despite the fact I couldn't play with him the way we wanted to, the boy loved me. Often on days when it was to wet and muddy for me to venture outside the boy would do all he could to cheer me up. He'd put on little shows just for me, preforming all the little tricks and acrobatics that his family was famous for, just to get me to laugh and smile.

On the nights that his nightmares were at their worst we would cuddle together in bed with cups of hot chocolate and I'd tell him stories. In the morning I'd place him on my lap and wheel him back to his room, I promised him Bruce would never know if he didn't want him to. Secretly I think Bruce already knew, but he would never interfere with my time with Richard.

Time went by and the nightmares stopped and then Richard changed, just like Bruce had. They told me not to worry, that they were just bonding, that they were training Richard to take over the family business. I worried that this was putting too much pressure on the boy, that Bruce was pushing him too hard or pushing him into something he didn't want. Both of them, and even Alfred, assured me that this is what he wanted and if it ever became to much he'd stop.

* * *

A few months later I learned what they had been doing so late at night. I think I fainted for a moment because the next thing I knew Richard was holding me up in my chair and both of them were looking at me with worry in their eyes.

To say this secret scared me was an understatement, but once I was done being scared I was furious and hurt. I didn't talk to Bruce or Alfred for days, despite Richard trying to convince me otherwise I was upset and angry at Bruce for doing this and then bringing a young boy into it.

It took me weeks to come to terms with their...nightly activities, I didn't approve and it scared the hell out of me that they were doing this, but I couldn't stop them I knew that. So every night since I found out I would stay up waiting for them despite them telling me that I didn't have to and that I should get my sleep. Some nights Bruce had to carry me to my bed because I had fallen asleep waiting for them.

It wasn't long after that, that Robin decided I needed a name too, even if I would never go out into the field, he and Bruce debated for days over it. Eventually Richard came up with a name for me, he decided to name me Killdeer, after the bird, he said he named me that because the mother Killdeer would lure predators away from her young by faking a broken wing. Even to the point of getting dangerously close to the predator. He said I reminded him of that because if either of them were ever in trouble he knew that's exactly what I'd do.

* * *

Years passed in this manner and the little boy I knew and loved was slowly becoming a teenager. He was growing up, already he could pick me up and carry me around...something he confessed to enjoying, but he would always be my little bird. It took some time, but eventually he came to see me as a second mother. I told him he didn't have to call me that, and that I would never try to replace his mother, he just looked at me and said "I know." with this big smile on his face.

And just like all little birds I knew he would leave one day, I just didn't expect that day to be so soon. He was still a boy in my eyes and I realized he always would be.

So on the day he left to find his own path...I let him go and only when I knew he was gone and couldn't hear me...did I let myself cry. My baby bird was growing up...and I wasn't ready.

Richard still talked to me as often as he could and he'd visit now and then, but it wasn't the same as what we had, had. I missed my baby bird terribly, but I knew if I ever said anything he would come home and be miserable so long as it made me happy. I couldn't do that to him...no matter how much his absence hurt me.


	3. Jason Todd

Once again I own nothing but my Oc everything else belongs to DC Comics

Bruce worried me even more after Richard left. Without a Robin to help him he was coming home with more and more injuries. He was running himself ragged and it worried both me and Alfred, we worried he would meet an early grave at this point.

Then one night after Batman had been near Crime Alley doing something or other, Bruce would never share the details of his nights with me, he had another tag-along.

Once again Bruce had brought home another little boy, he was almost as small as Richard had been and he was filthy and wearing ratty clothes that were more like rags, he couldn't have been more than ten and he looked at Bruce with mistrust. He had green eyes, full with the harsh pains Gotham gave her citizens, he was lightly tanned underneath the dirt and he had red hair that obviously hadn't been washed or combed in a while.

I saw the instance he noticed me, it wasn't hard to tell, because his eyes widened and once he got over the shock he had a mixture of sadness, worry, and anger that he immediately directed at Bruce.

He thought Bruce had put me in the chair, he thought I was abused and that made him furious...it was almost sweet, barely knowing me and already so protective.

It was only after I explained how I came to be in a wheelchair that he calmed down and then reluctantly apologized. That was my first impression of Jason Todd.

After a few weeks Jason became very attached to me, even more than Richard, we would read together and play board games, but still his temper worried me. Jason was a very angry boy and I understood, but I worried for him. I worried that Jason's temper would get him into trouble, that it would consume him, that one day I would look at him and no longer be able to recognize the little boy I was coming to love.

We worked on his temper, much as he hated it, he needed all the help he could get. I knew Bruce was training him to be the next Robin and that terrified me just as much as it did with Richard. I taught Jason what I could, during the first months after my accident I was angry too and I told him this, I taught him to count, to walk away, to hit a wall or tree if he had too, but never and innocent person, I taught him that it was ok to be angry, but it wasn't ok to take it out on the wrong people.

Six months after Bruce had started training him Jason received his own Robin costume and with it he dyed his hair black to be like the first Robin...his idol, he said it was the best day of his life and he promised me no matter what...he'd come back...he called me Mama Bird.

More years went by and Jason's temper only seemed to get worse the longer he was Robin, he was losing himself just as I had feared. Villains were being beaten harder by him with more and more force, but not once did he ever lose his temper with me and never did he raise a hand to strike me or Alfred. He was my second son, my Jaybird, and I loved him just as much as the first. I comforted him in the night, I let him rant and rave and cry and scream if he wanted to and then once he was done I held him close curled up in my lap.

Then one night he didn't return...my Jaybird...my second son...wasn't ever going to come home again...he would never turn sixteen...we would never stay up late talking or play games...I would never see him smile just for me...I would never be called Mama Bird again... and it nearly broke me. When they told me he was dead I cried, I screamed, I broke...worst of all I couldn't even attend his funeral because it was raining. After that I don't think anyone could have fixed me.


End file.
